The new President of the European Parliament is the old one: As expected, Roberta Metsola from Malta was re-elected on Tuesday at the first session of the European Parliament.
The Christian Democrat from Malta received 562 votes. The EU Parliament, which met in Strasbourg on Tuesday for its first session following the EU elections, has a total of 720 representatives. Metsola’s only competitor, the Spaniard Irene Montero from the European Left, received 61 votes.
On Thursday, the EU Parliament will vote on a second term for EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. And it might be much closer than with Metsola.
Although the Christian Democrats, Social Democrats and Liberals, who put together the personnel package at EU level, together have around 400 of the 720 seats, there is no party discipline in the EU Parliament – dissenters in the secret vote are to be expected.
For this reason, von der Leyen has recently sought approval from several parliamentary groups. The only thing she ruled out was cooperation with the newly founded far-right group “Patriots for Europe”, to which the FPÖ also belongs.
